State Fat Index Crowns New Heavyweight Champ

According to a new Gallup poll, Mississippi is the most obese state.(Credit: Getty Images)

Put down the crawdads. Mississippi has unseated West Virginia for the title of fattest state for the first time in three years, with an obesity rate of 35.4 percent.

But they were neck-and-neck - or double-chin-and-double-chin - with West Virginia, whose obesity rate was 34.4 percent.

Gallup has compiled this list every year since 2008 by asking a random sample of 178,072 adults about their height and weight, calculating their body mass index, or BMI, as part of the Gallup-Healthways Well-Being Index. Anyone with a BMI of over 30 is classified as obese.

Mississippi's fattest-state crowning follows the passage of its so-called "anti-Bloomberg bill" last March, which prevents municipalities from limiting how much Mississippians can eat or drink. The governor signed the bill a week after a judge blocked former New York City Mayor Michael Bloomberg's supersize soda ban.

On the flip side, Montana was crowned the state with the lowest obesity rate of 19.6 percent, down from 22.0 percent in 2012. However, the national obesity rate edged up to 27.1 percent from 26.2 percent.

According to the poll, people living in the 10 fattest states were more likely to have chronic diseases, including high cholesterol, diabetes, depression and cancer.